


passif

by minimalcoloration



Category: Fire Emblem Heroes, Fire Emblem Series
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, F/M, Failing relationship, Heavy Angst, Kiran is heavily implied but not written in
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-02
Updated: 2018-04-02
Packaged: 2019-04-17 05:56:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14182329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minimalcoloration/pseuds/minimalcoloration
Summary: Take your own advice Robin, he thinks as he feels the void in his heart shrivel up and the tears come, take your own advice.He doesn’t.





	passif

Robin knows how to get out of a lot of situations, from lowly brigands to elaborate escape routes to flee from an army twice their size- it’s what he’s best at. Everyone he had spent time with back in Ylisse, every single conversation, every single smile, every glance, they had been nothing but good. Maybe that spoiled him, brought forth the notion that maybe _just maybe_ he was good at talking to people. Here, realms away at the center of something that never belonged to him should have been no different. At first it wasn’t, at first he had seen Chrom, seen Lucina, a multitude of faces he knew and faces he _loved._ The new heroes were fascinating in their own right, lives with plenty of weight and shared interests that weren’t solely based on the competency of battle. A home away from home, a safe haven away from the burdens of dragons and horrors of blood run cold. Hindsight, something he knows all too well, comes to him at the worst moments, and it drifts around him like a mourning veil. In that hindsight, he understands that believing anywhere to be a safe haven was his first mistake. Yet when he glances at their sleeping form in the shifting moonlight, he knows there are a myriad of others.

He closes the door. 

Love is complicated, intangible, unobtainable, and cold. It leaves him freezing beneath the surface and digs guilt beneath the surface of his skin so that he constantly feels uncomfortable living his own life. Maybe believing in safety was his first mistake, but love was his worst. The feeling of wanting to crawl out of his own skin is all he feels these days, and the guilt that follows is like a constant weight that presses him into the sharpness of his mattress in the dead of night. Most days Robin can’t sleep, and most days end up turning into weeks in the library. They don’t know, his friends, the souls that reside here in the plane between life and death, and he doesn’t want them to know. He’s scared; he knows he’s scared of their criticisms, of the pity that he will never receive, of the blame that will cloak him in the shadows. It’s worse to keep it to yourself, the memories from Ylisse whispers in the darkness of the library as he picks up anything remotely close to a book and makes his way to his desk, things will only get worse if you don’t face your issues. Things are already bad, he thinks as he opens the pages to something he doesn’t even intend to read but that brings him comfort regardless, things are already bad and they’re only going to get worse. Take your own advice Robin, he thinks as he feels the void in his heart shrivel up and the tears come, take your own advice. 

He doesn’t.

Robin feels like a fool every time they smile at him, affection aimed at him that he doesn’t return, so in love with someone idealized. They love a him that isn’t scared, a Robin whose words could put a simple maid swooning, one who knew how to return it. Everything he doesn’t have, everything he doesn’t do, and every scar he doesn’t have. Maybe that’s why he keeps going, fools them into loving him with kind smiles and morning kisses when all he feels is guilt. It’s bad, he knows it’s bad, feels the depth of the ocean in his lungs every time they assure him that they love him. Don’t love me, is what he wants to say, wants to scream out into the mountains, wants to beg them to let go because he’s too scared. He doesn’t, he smiles and says that he loves them too and sinks further into the abyss of the tears that threaten to spill over.

He lies.

At one point, he did love, he loved their smile, loved spending time with them, loved the way that their nose crinkles when they think too hard, or the way they sung their feet on one of the high chairs in the library. Loved them so much that every waking moment wanted to be spent with them, wanted to swoop them off their feet, wanted to fall in love all over again. Robin wonders where that love went, where the kind smiles that were just a tad bit lopsided, where the mornings where he could tickle them into waking up to head out for the day, where the nights spent stargazing on a hill overtaken by flowers while sharing his same ink smelling coat went. All it takes is one day, he thinks, one morning to wake up and to look over and to see that it’s _gone._

He stays closer to them now than ever before.

How do you save someone from your own being? How do you shield someone who you don’t want to see hurt? All of the allies he’s saved with his tactics don’t count here, there are no weapons, there is no magic, and it’s only him and his words. The rational part tells him there’s only one way to be freed from the hole he’s dug himself into, to hurt. It feels like a battle he’s destined to lose, like watching one of his friends die by his mistake, like feeling the failure creep up into his throat and suffocate him. There is no saving grace, no last minute tactic that will get him out, only the bracing against a tidal wave that threatens to throw him off his feet.

Love is complicated, and it eats away at his happiness until there’s nothing left, leaves him hollow and empty and caged against every single mistake he’s made. Being alive hurts, deeper than any wound, when love is all that consumes. Robin looks to Chrom, remembers the way he looked on his wedding day, remembers the happiness on his face when he almost broke down his tent flap just to tell him that he was _happy._ Every tear unshed comes to light then, hits the floor like silent slashes across his already aching heart, and makes him want to leave his own body. He doesn’t have enough emotion left in him to feel jealous, he doesn’t want to love anymore, and he wants to be alone. Maybe that’s all he needed, maybe that’s why he knocks on their door after all his tears have dried and takes a deep breath in.

Robin wants to look for excuses, wants to run away from his problems, and wants to be a coward. It feels like taking a knife through his own heart when he’s already been bleeding. It’s the soundest tactic, to be blessed with care, but when he sees their face it’s nothing but a curse. He doesn’t want to care, maybe not caring would make things easier, maybe he would stop trying to cry tears that can’t come out, maybe he wouldn’t be so guilty in the middle of the night. It kills him to breathe, in those moments he feels like he’s a dying, feel like he’s claiming another life on the battlefield. It has to be done, he reminds himself through the pain that clouds his thoughts and leaves him shaking in his the cold of his coat, and this is only for the better. Better sounds like a dream to him, something so far away that he’ll never reach it. Miles away, better is where his happiness lies, where he’s actually in love. Here, in the fear of his stance and the guilt of his words, there is no happiness; he is not in love.

Maybe that’s why he doesn’t flinch when they close the door on his face.

Maybe that’s why he doesn’t feel anything when he hears them crying on the other side.

**Author's Note:**

> @drivedef on tumblr.
> 
> I'm sorry I can't tell you how I feel.


End file.
